(Photo Illustration - MetroCreativeConnection - Editor's Notes by Christina Myer)

I’m a little slow on the uptake for this one — what? It’s been a busy few … years — but I’m just catching up to the news that someone had to file a lawsuit to ask the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to decide whether to protect the yellow-spotted woodland salamander.

You know the one. It’s extremely rare and found only on shale and sandstone cliffs, with isolated populations in West Virginia, southwest Virginia, eastern Kentucky and east Tennessee. Organizations such as the Nature Conservancy and the Kentucky Natural Lands Trust have been trying to protect them.

“These are some of the most imperiled salamanders on the planet and they can’t wait any longer for protections,” said Will Harlan, a senior scientist at the Center for Biological Diversity. “Without federal action these salamanders will go extinct on our watch.”

These beautiful creatures (yes, salamanders are adorable) aren’t the only salamanders that choose Appalachia. I guess they’re a bit like us — the rough and wild mountains feel like home. So according to the center, there are more species of salamander in Appalachia than anywhere else in the world. That’s wonderful, except that approximately 60% of salamander species are facing extinction. That includes the yellow-spotted woodland, which likes the crevices on rock faces, in humid climates that still have plenty of days with cool temperatures. (They need the humidity because if they dry out, they can’t breathe through their skin).

As far as we know now, there may be only a few hundred of them left. A little more than 60 have been seen over the past 20 years, because the habitat that most suits them is disappearing. We all know what has been done to so many mountain tops in Appalachia.

According to the Center for Biological Diversity, more than 500 mountains and 1.4 million acres of forest in Appalachia have been destroyed by mountaintop removal mining over the past 40 years.

Those same mountaintops are, of course, the yellow-spotted woodland salamander’s habitat. So, in August 2022, the center, along with Appalachian Mountain Advocates, Appalachian Voices, Citizens Coal Council, The Clinch Coalition, Coal River Mountain Watch, Dogwood Alliance, Forest Keeper, Heartwood, Kentucky Heartwood and Kentucky Waterways Alliance petitioned “the Secretary of the Interior, through the United States Fish and Wildlife Service to protect the yellow-spotted woodland salamander (Plethodon pauleyi) as an endangered or threatened species and to concurrently designate critical habitat.”

A quick check on Thursday of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s Environmental Conservation Online System, which brags about “Conserving the Nature of America,” shows that petition is still, five-and-a-half years later, “under review.” (Hence the recent lawsuit). This despite a notation that the salamander’s habitat is so small, a visitor to the website will need to “Zoom in!” to see its current range.

If you’re still with me, thanks for sticking around past the word “salamander.” And, think about what it means that we are not protecting a fragile and beautiful creature that is truly one of our own. It thrives in our harshest environments and is part of what makes this state so wild and wonderful while other species such as the eastern redback salamander choose the easy life in lower-elevation leaf litter and rocks it can find almost anywhere in a range that stretches from Quebec to North Carolina.

It may seem trivial. And yes, maybe I just didn’t have the energy to dive into something that’s more on everyone’s minds these days. But if we keep missing opportunities to get the little things right, what chance do we have on matters that feel so much more pressing?

Christina Myer is executive editor of The Parkersburg News and Sentinel. She can be reached via e-mail at cmyer@newsandsentinel.com.